Conscientious Objection
by Quirel
Summary: History is rife with those who believed that war and conflict would cease upon first contact. Either Mankind would be shocked into silence, or we would embrace lasting peace.  Unfortunately, there has always been someone willing to fight the old wars.


**0359 Hours, 22nd March 2535  
>Gamma Cygni System, Intermediate Orbit<br>Slipstream Survey Station #047 "Sagan"  
><strong>

The Sagan was never intended to be pretty. It was an ugly collection of spars, conduits, and antenna radiating out from a central life support unit, itself enclosed by a reactor, docking arm, and MASER tower. If one studied it long enough, the conclusion would be that the Sagan had indeed been manufactured all at the same time, and by the same designer, albeit one who valued utility over style.

There was a single shuttle on the docking arm, a two-seat interplanetary craft with a largish cargo compartment and an aging reaction drive. UNSS was printed on the side; United Nations Slipstream Survey.

The lone occupant of the habitat module was sitting in the office, waiting for the computer to respond. There are individuals who can take seven weeks in a cramped habitat with dignity, going in and coming out as perky and fresh as they went in.

Camilla Rosalia was not one of those people.

She took a red plastic cylinder studded with copper contact points, and inserted it into a keyhole on the computer console. The console checked the key's identification sequence against a rotating roster of codes, and then powered up. The gravity plating in the office had only just warmed up to full strength, allowing her to sit still in her chair long enough to finish signing into the Sagan's computer system. After a lengthy iris scan, the screen prompted her to read the Cole Protocol. Cameras monitored the movement of her eyes to make sure that she didn't skip any sentences.

* * *

><p><em><strong>United Nations Space Command Emergency Priority Order 098831A-1<strong> **  
>Encryption Code:<strong> Red _  
><em><strong>Public Key:<strong> file/ First light/_  
><em> <strong>From:<strong> UNSC/NAVCOM Fleet H.T. Ward **  
>To:<strong> ALL UNSC PERSONNEL **  
>Subject:<strong> General Order 098831A-1 ("The Cole Protocol") **  
>Classification:<strong> RESTRICTED (BGX Directive) _

_**The Cole Protocol** To safeguard and protect the Inner Colonies and Earth, all UNSC vessels or stations must not be captured with intact navigation databases that may lead Covenant forces to human civilian population centers. If any Covenant forces are detected:_

_1. Activate selective purge of databases on all ship-based and planetary data networks. _  
><em>2. Initiate triple-screen check to ensure all data has been erased and all backups neutralized. <em>  
><em>3. Execute viral data scavengers (Download from UNSCTTP:EPWW:COLEPROTOCOL/Virtualscav/fbr.091) _  
><em>4. If retreating from Covenant forces, all ships must enter Slipstream space with randomized vectors NOT directed toward Earth, the Inner Colonies, or any other human population center. <em>  
><em>5. In case of imminent capture by Covenant forces and boarders, all UNSC ships <strong>MUST <strong>self-destruct. _

_Violation of this directive will be considered an act of TREASON and pursuant to UNSC Military law articles JAG 845-P and JAG 7556-L, such violations are punishable by life imprisonment or execution._

* * *

><p>"To safeguard the Inner Colonies and Earth." Camilla felt a twinge of... something every time she read that line. The Outer Colonies weren't<em> completely <em>gone; there were still a few standing between the Inner Colonies and the Covenant, and a few on the other side of Human Space. In temperament, at least, if not in designation. The way Cole had worded that directive, though, it seemed as if the UNSC was writing the Outer Colonies off.

It had fueled rumors that the UNSC had provoked the Covenant. 'Feeding the military-industrial complex, exterminating the Outer Colonies,' had been the popular accusation. 'And being lauded as heroes in the process.'

Camilla clicked the 'Continue' button and fell into her routine. She gave permission to the system to initiate a probe launch and pulled her homework out from under the console. Data governing Slipspace entry conditions flowed across her console, and estimates for the reentry translocation of the probe were offered. She keyed in the go-ahead codes. Across the station, a nearly solid titanium shell with 'Sojourner' etched on one side collapsed into a vortex of purple light.

A half-minute passed before her console lit up again. The probe had passed through Slipspace for less than a second, emerged outside of Motif's gravity well, and beamed the collected data back to the Sagan with its MASER. Predictably, it was well over three million kilometers from the predicted exit point.

Camilla looked through the data, understanding little. Analyzing it was the job of the AI back on Motif's orbital dock. The false-color imagery was, as usual, the most interesting. She could pick out rifts, stretches, and even a lens effect caused by a large mass, probably a freighter.

She keyed the command for a retrieval drone to recover the probe and pushed away from the computer, her job done for the next two hours. A cradle on the bottom of the station rotated to fix upon the section of the sky from which the probe's beacon was coming. Moe's fuel tanks were filled from an armored reservoir, the engines were warmed up, and the retrieval drone took off with help from a magnetic catapult. Once Minimum Safe Distance was reached, the LOX-Methane engines ignited, launching the drone off into the void atop a pillar of purple flame.

Three retrieval drones, always in some state of disrepair, always sent off to rescue the searcher. One of the previous reservists stationed on the Sagan had named the retrieval drones and the probe, against regulations, after the characters from a Korean cartoon. Drone Alpha, Beta, and Gamma became Moe, Savue, and Bloque, always racing across the night sky to rescue Sojourner the Alchemist, saving each other as often as they saved Sojourner. Apparently, all of the subsequent reservists had been fans of the show, as the names and the little chibi drawings of each character painted on the drones had yet to be removed.

Pushing the drones from her mind, Camilla opened her notebook and reread what she'd written last night. As a training officer in the reserves, she had plenty of time and government grants to attend school, but her assignment aboard the Sagan took her further from her professors than she would have liked. On the other hand, the Slipspace station had direct access to the AI on the docking orbital. Westminster, either out of a sense of duty or a genuine interest, was an almost endless stream of constructive criticism and enlightened debate over history and sociology.

Right now, she was taking the bastard child of those two subjects in college. She'd always been cursed with the tendency to see both sides of an argument, and this class was only muddying the waters without presenting a solution.

"Jonesist Obstructionism," she read from the textbook on her laptop. "The nonpartisan theory that a corrupt war, or war at all, is best stopped by low-level infiltration and sabotage of military operations."

She shifted. She was sitting cross-legged and hunched back in her chair, a compromise between comfort and gravity.

"Derived from the Mother Jones's Freedom Network for Social Progress policy during the Rainforest wars, that 'Joining the [Military] and fragging your commanding officer is morally equivalent to protesting, and much more effective.'"

Camilla frowned and stared at that line. If there was a difference between that and domestic terrorism, it was beyond her.

She keyed up her report and glanced over her thesis. So far, it looked like the reasons behind conscientious objection were principles against war itself, principles against the reasons or methods of waging a war, or cowardice in face of general conscription. That last one was probably going to be changed to 'self preservation' in the final draft of her essay.

The middle option was the most nebulous. The earliest example she could find was in the earliest part of the twenty-first century, when Israeli pilots had refused to bomb civilian targets in the surrounding territories. A letter had been filed to the President of the Israeli state professing that they were still loyal, and they would gladly continue to serve, but not under that program.

If one expanded the definition slightly, any time a person refused to carry out orders he didn't agree with would be an example. Polar opposite of the Nuremburg defense, though she wondered if it was automatically any better.

She sighed. This report wasn't going to be hard, just time-consuming.

"Ms. Rosalia," a voice spoke from the console. "Please respond."

Taking care not to drop the computer, Camilla turned around to look at Westminster's avatar on the computer screen, a series of unfolding lines that joined into ever more complex fractals.

"Go ahead, Westminster."

"Orders have come down from Command to run a full diagnostic and system scan on the recently-used Slipspace Probe. Ready the Sagan's computer system for a full wipe. Do not initiate wipe until final confirmation has been received. Begin refueling of intrasystem shuttle."

Camilla flipped the laptop closed and stood up. "Westminster, is this a drill?"

The symbol on the screen, a double-triscoda, folded up into a golden spiral rendered in triangles.

"Unconfirmed. Please initiate program scan immediately," There was a short pause, and Westminster lost some of his officious tone. "Don't panic, Ms. Rosalia. I'll be monitoring the station. If assistance is required, please contact me."

Camilla nodded. This was already different from normal exercises; usually, they quizzed her on the proper procedure for activating the system wipe. In the event of a practice wipe going too far, it was a pain getting everything installed again.

In the mystery novels she read, the author always described a numb feeling the protagonist got from news of disaster. It wasn't the numbness you got when your leg fell asleep, though. At this point, she realized realized that it was similar to the feeling you get when you narrowly avoid running over a pedestrian.

The virus had been downloaded under close ONI supervision when the Cole Protocol went into effect, and was stored on a separate hard drive that had to be manually connected to the main database in the event of a wipe. During orientation, the ONI representative showed her how to operate the system and admitted that such a clunky system was in place to prevent the viral code from falling into Innie hands. And no, the representative hadn't found it to be overly paranoid.

The hard drive was in a bullet-proof case that required her fingerprints for access. She waited for confirmation, typed in a short code (not one of the codes that would destroy the drive if she was captured and tortured) and pulled the contents out.

She pulled the red plug out of the drive's port and connected it to the Sagan's computer with the specially provided cable and waited for the system to recognize its eminent demise.

_Transfer cable detected in UTP Port #4_

_Memory Wipe Protocol Pending._

_Enter 32 Digit Authorization Code to continue..._

Camilla blinked, rolled her eyes, and contacted Westminster. "West, it's asking for a password."

"Please stand by, Miss Rosalia. I will send the code when I receive authorization to do so," came the reply after the light-speed delay. "Miss Rosalia, this may take some time. I urge you to pack your bags and get ready to leave. The Covenant don't dally when they attack."

The operator of the Sagan ran her hands over her forehead, still wanting to wake up from this dream. "So this is the real deal, is it? Are you going to get out alright?"

"I am a second-generation AI, Miss Rosalia. I hardly think I shall be the one to turn out the lights on the way out."

Camilla shrugged at the AI's attempt at humor and gently kicked the console. Her chair scooted across the room until she came to a rest against the opposite wall. She flipped the lid on her laptop closed, shoved it in her bag, and started gathering her stuff from the room.

A few minutes later, the insistent beeping of the console snapped her attention back to business. A shuttle was arriving under hard deceleration burn. Somebody was in a hurry to get to the station, and they were hailing her to extend the docking guides. A formality, mostly, but at least they were making an effort.

"The guides need a few seconds to activate," Camilla told the pilot over the radio. "Who do I have the pleasure of addressing?"

It was a little too formal, but at least they were being courteous themselves, so she might as well return the favor.

"This is Second Lieutenant Miles Vaughn. I'm with ELINTSEC, but I can't explain further over a tightbeam. Ears only, you see."

Camilla glanced at the ELINTSEC logo on the file transfer window and sighed. "Fine. Transmit the identification codes, and I'll authorize the docking procedure."

* * *

><p>The airlock hissed open, revealing a man who looked like he had seen the world. That seemed to be a recent fashion amongst the local Navy officers. By the time you were thirty, male or female, you had to have crows feet and worry lines.<p>

"At ease," he said before walking past Camilla. The docking hallway was a simple 't' with three gear chambers and airlocks forming the crossbars. There was barely enough room for two people in the junction.

"Sir, what's going on here? Are the Covenant coming?" It felt somewhat strange saying that, as she already knew the answer, but she didn't know how else to broach the subject.

"You answered your own question," Vaughn replied. "Your scans picked up two CCS cruisers and a destroyer inbound, going to get here in about ten minutes. Destroyer looks like it'll be two minutes later, if the guesswork we call Slipspace physics holds up."

Reaching the office, he plopped into the chair and turned to face her. "I can't express how much I hate to break it to you like that. ONI sent me here to wipe the computers because they wanted an officer to do the job, so you can pack your stuff up and get to safety before the Covenant show up. If you take my shuttle, it's got a flight plan set up to meet with the frigate _Upon the Parapet_."

His mud brown eyes radiated sincerity as he pushed the chair over to the console. "I really am sorry, because you're going to lose everything you call home. What you've got to do is get to safety, and then try to contact your friends and family. The first one is easy now, but it'll be nearly impossible when the cruisers show up."

Camilla nodded and thanked him. Slowly, mechanically, she exited the office, started throwing her clothes into her suitcase, followed by toiletries and computer equipment. She carried her sole possessions to the dock, started the airlock cycle, and paused. The Sagan was going to die to the Covenant. Why not bring equipment with her?

She glanced at her chronometer. If the Covenant were going to get here when Lieutenant Vaughn said they were, she had nine minutes left. Maybe more, maybe less, given how good the UNSC was at predicting Slipspace transitions.

Camilla thought about what she had heard about refugee camps. Too many guns, not enough food.

For all she knew, the Covenant would exit right beside the station in the next ninety seconds.

Whatever she got off the Sagan wouldn't be enough, but it could help.

She dropped her suitcase into the airlock and dashed into the kitchen. She pulled out a drawer, emptied the pots and pans onto the floor, and systematically went through the cupboards, sweeping cans and shrink-wrapped packages into the drawer. When she had emptied the kitchen of all the non-perishables, she grabbed the drawer's handles and dragged it to the airlock. Then she ran back, grabbed the medical kit and threw it into a bag with some batteries and charger.

She was almost back when the siren went silent.

Camilla stood in the dock, feeling like an idiot. She picked up her chatter, dialed Westminster, and asked "Hey, West, is the alert over? The sirens shut off."

"Not at all, Ms. Rosalia," was the reply. Camilla's stomach began churning, her body reacting to an unknown danger while her mind tried to reason its way through the contradiction. "I read that the station is still in standby; the sirens should still be audible. Please check the intercom system. I understand that this is taking too long, but please be patient. I will be transmitting the authorization codes to you shortly."

The numb feeling returned in full force as the call terminated. This predicament was surreal, like the dreams that were just weird enough for you to realize they were dreams. Westminster had a dedicated communication MASER to the Sagan; he could not be mistaken about the alarms. But he didn't know about the Navy officer on board, since he'd indicated that it was Camilla's job to activate the database wipe.

ONI's paranoia, grilled into her over the past seven weeks, supplied the answer. Insurrectionist sympathizer. An officer who was working with the Innies, using the confusion of the Covenant invasion to steal a copy of the viral scavenger.

The virus had been designed for "No Return, No Recovery". Once introduced to a database, it would not be stopped as it gobbled up sensitive information and replaced it with randomized gibberish. The version reserved for immobile installations, like the Sagan, took it a step further and would render the computer hardware completely unusable, even in the case of a reformat and reinstall.

If Innies got the virus, they could easily cripple key portions of the UNSC. Shipyards, data servers, personal computers, anything that was running a UNSC-designed operating system was fair game.

She found herself walking back to the office, her heart thumping like an artillery battery. Vaughn, if that was his name, was staring intently at the progress bar on the computer screen. File names flashed by almost too fast for the eye to track. A map of the computer's file hierarchy was fading from red to gray, piece by piece.

Camilla wasn't fooled. If you had to, you could rig up a program that would call up a screen like that and leave you free to copy the real files. More tellingly, the communications section on the taskbar was lit up like a Christmas tree.

Vaughn turned around to look at her. "You're still here?"

"Yes," she replied, failing to keep her voice even. "Are you going to leave on time?"

The officer smiled. "Yeah. The Covenant are going to get here first, but I'm getting a safe escape plotted out."

"You remembered to disconnect the shuttles from the main computer, right?"

He didn't blanch. He didn't panic. He didn't point out that there _was_ no file transfer between unoccupied shuttles and the station. He just turned to look at the console and asked "What?"

Quick as greased lightning with a tailwind, Camilla grabbed the key in the edge of the console, twisted, and pulled it out. If Vaughn had any doubts about what the red key sailing out the edge of his vision did, the doubts vanished when the computer screen and the keyboard powered down.

Camilla raced out of the office and down the docking tunnel. Her year spent in high school track meant that she covered the distance in record time, though it didn't help her outrun the bullets.

A short burst flew past her and smacked into the bulkhead. Camilla dodged, stumbled, and fell through the door to the utility airlock. She turned around and caught a glimpse of an M7S SMG before she kicked the door closed. The heavy metal door slid into place with a pneumatic hiss, a dozen locks cycled, and the lights around the doorjamb turned from red to green.

Chills ran down her spine. Camilla patted her clothes, looking for bullet holes and blood spots. A cursory check revealed that she had the same number of holes in her body that she woke up with.

The inner airlock door began to cycle open. Camilla seized an M6E from its rack and fired at one of the transparent panes of the outer airlock door, cracking one. The lights around the inner door turned orange, and it locked down until the damage to the outer door could be assessed.

For a full minute, she tried to think of something other than the fact that she had been shot at. Her first instinct was to call Westminster, ask for help. A quick check of her chatter revealed that it wasn't getting any reception. It had to be Vaughn's doing; there were repeaters all around the station to prevent dead zones.

Camilla put the pistol back down on the rack and began donning the vacuum suit. She'd called ONI paranoid when she heard that all of the rooms in the station had a sidearm ready. But, as it turns out, the difference between paranoia and being crazy prepared is the presence of an emergency.

There was a sound of something breaking through the plastic wall, and the lights around the door went dark. Vaughn had cut the power to the door. He couldn't unlock it, couldn't get through, but if Camilla wanted back in, she'd have to go through one of the other airlocks. Vaughn didn't want to be outflanked.

The first part of the vacuum suit was the coverall, a thermally regulated one-piece that covered everything up to the neck. Next was the tether harness, a segmented vest of hard plastic with attachment points for tools and power packs. The boots were next, followed by helmet and rebreather.

Camilla slid the helmet into the collar of the coverall and locked it with a twist. Digital readouts blinked at the lower edge of the visor, informing her that she had 154 minutes left on the rebreather, the suit was airtight, and it was currently 0428 hours.

She cycled the outer airlock and exited, taking the M6E with her as an afterthought.  
>The airlock was in the shadow of the Sagan, and her visor took time to adjust polarization. Space stretched out beyond her, stars gleaming like a diamond crushed into dust and blown across black velvet. And in the corner of her vision, she saw Motif, the brightest point of light.<p>

The reservist glanced down at her gloved hand, the red plastic cylinder dully reflecting the light. It rolled out of her hand when she opened her fingers, slowly floating up to the stars. She backhanded it and watched it disappear forever.

Camilla tore her eyes away from the stars, turning her attention to her predicament. She'd locked Vaughn out of the computer system, _in theory_, and had thrown the key away. The flip side was that she couldn't be certain that Vaughn would stay locked out. He, or whoever was working with him, had the skill to hack into Westminster's sensors, so the AI was unaware that anyone else had been present out on the station. He could hack into the computer, if given enough time.

This was the point where, in the summer blockbusters her friends had always watched when they got bored, the action hero would overload the reactor and ride the blast wave with a large section of bulkhead for a kite. Unfortunately, the station's power source was a low-output fission pile that couldn't be accessed from the outside without the proper tools. Tools which were usually mounted on a large crane on the resupply ship.

She had stood there for too long, pondering her options, when her radio buzzed.

"Miss Rosalia," Vaughn said. "I think it's best if we talk things out like adults. Will you respond?"

Her first suspicion was that he was going to trace her radio. She was mildly disgusted when she remembered that her suit had a transponder built in anyway. Caution was good, but there was no need to descend into ONI's level of paranoia.

"What the Hell..." Camilla muttered. She pressed a button with her chin and spoke into the reed mike. "Yeah, sure, I got nothing better to do."

"Would you like to come inside, or are you comfortable?" The man sounded serious.

"After you shot at me?" Camilla asked incredulously. "Yeah, I'd like to, but I think we got trust issues."

She glanced at the two shuttles to either side of her, weighing her options. Both craft, as was the rest of the station, were lit up with floodlights. "You know, I can understand that you think the UNSC is a fascist state bent upon subjugating you to its economic will. Sometimes, I get out of bed feeling that way. But stealing sensitive computer programs while the Covenant burn Motif? I think you need to work on your priorities."

"_What?"_

"You heard me," Camilla said with bravado she didn't feel. "Are you with the URF, or are you a local operator? Hacking into Westminster's sensors on this station is a good job, but you can't possibly bluff him forever. So go ahead and take the virus module. You'll have a frigate running in autistic mode bearing down on you before you reach your rendezvous."

"... That's not what..." Vaughn stuttered, then sighed explosively. "OK, Miss Rosalia, I was the senior ECM officer on the Heracles. We were the first ship to make contact with the Covenant and return to warn everyone else. I met the survivors we picked up from deep Groombridge-1830 orbit. I returned with Cole's fleet to retake Harvest. I've _seen_ what the invaders do!"

Camilla, despite herself, began to have doubts. He could be lying. He could be telling the truth. She couldn't know either way. If her paranoia was unwarranted, then she was holding up the destruction of sensitive material. If she had been right, then she was upholding the Cole Protocol.

Her thoughts began to turn to the retrieval drones on the underside of the station. If she could get to them, use their radios to hail Westminster, maybe she could get backup. Maybe.

She turned her back on the shuttles and walked along a path outlined in worn yellow paint. The boots she wore were known as flip-flops. A frame around the sole contained magnets that activated and shut down in tune with a normal, if slightly exaggerated, gait. Pulling up with the heel released the boot from the hull, pushing down with the heel or toes powered the magnets back up. It was slightly awkward, not meant for running in, and the reservist couldn't get the thought of being ambushed out of her head.

"Are you listening?"

"Yes, Vaughn, I'm listening."

"What I saw is that the Covenant are here to burn Mankind. You, me, Innies, Reachers, Siberians, Earth, whatever. They don't give a damn about our politics. Some of the Innies joined us, sure, but there's entire settlements and colonies out there beyond authorized space. The Innies? They just plan on hiding out and waiting for the storm to blow over."

Camilla felt shivers run down her spine, premonitions of where Vaughn was going with his monologue.

She was at the drone carriage, two out of three of the drones present. By sighting through the third tube, Camilla imagined that she could pick out Moe from the rest of the stars, speeding through the night sky to rescue Sojourner.

She crawled into the armored lean-to that protected the maintenance workspace and took the impact cover off the computer terminal. The screen flashed, showing three tabs over a menu, one of which was grayed out. Drone Alpha, Beta, Gamma. Moe, Savvue, and Bloque.

"OK, what does this have to do with intruding on a Slipspace probe station?" Camilla asked, ending the man's monologue. "I can't help but feel like you're going off on a tangent."

Vaughn was silent long enough to make Camilla nervous.

"For the past decade, ONI watchdogs have been carefully monitoring the traffic of Insurrectionist and sympathetic freighters, cataloging their routes and Slipspace vectors. There's not just one or two Innie colonies, there's dozens of them!"

Camilla gripped the console, her blood turned to ice and her stomach turned into a lead weight. She'd just made the connection between Vaughn, the ONI data, and the Sagan. A station with a MASER and broadcast dish that would reach across the solar system, or send a tightbeam communication that the UNSC couldn't overhear and the Covenant couldn't ignore.

"We're going to play one enemy off the other, Miss Rosalia. The Cole Protocol will protect us, but the Covenant will take months, maybe years, to burn through the Innie settlements. It's enough to buy us breathing room for a renewed defense."

Camilla stared at the blinking cursor on the computer screen, torn. She was a reservist, not prepared to fight a war. Especially not against other humans. Vaughn's plan, or the plan of the group he represented, would deal a crippling blow to the URF, let the UNSC spend more resources on fighting the Covenant. But how many people were sheltered on those distant colonies? Ten thousand, fifty thousand per colony? Tucked away inside asteroid belts and small moons to avoid the hounds of the UNSC and Covenant both, because they wanted to live their own lives? Fighting to live alone, when all of Humanity was struggling for survival.

"And you need me to reactivate the computer," Camilla sighed.

"It'll speed things up, yes."

Camilla reached to wipe the sweat out of her eyes, and was mildly annoyed when glove bounced off visor. In the bottom of the visor, the time read "0433 Hours". Time was almost up.

"Can I... Can I just think this through?"

"One minute, Camilla. When the Covenant get here, I'll have to fall back on my contingency plans. Decide fast."

Camilla's typing slowed and stopped. The Covenant were going to get here too fast, and who was she kidding? Even if she did get a message off to Westminster with the retrieval drones, West would be unable to help if Vaughn had interrupted the line from the MASER. Help would have to come by slowboat or not at all, which would give Vaughn all the time he needed to bypass the lockdown on the computer.

She was the operator of Slipspace Survey Station Sagan. Her primary objective, taking precedence over all other concerns, was to prevent astrogation data and military secrets from falling into enemy hands.

Despite that resolution, she didn't feel particularly brave as she resumed her typing. Yes, she felt better about her decision with every command she gave the retrieval drone, but there was still an element of fear. Maybe that's just the way suicide is; you're afraid each step of the way, but you do it because you have a cause worth dying for.

_No, wait, that's martyrdom._

Camilla finished typing, closed the computer terminal, and ducked out of the maintenance shack as the drone carriage began to rotate. The refueling lines retracted from Savue and Bloque as the drones prepared to take off.

"Miss Rosalia, do you read me?"

Above Camilla, a new star appeared in the night sky, flashing purple and blue before fading. The Sagan shuddered as the drones were magnetically accelerated to 1000 km per hour. Seconds later, when the station was far behind, the thrusters blossomed and accelerated the drones even more.

"Yes, Vaughn, I hear you," Camilla replied. Her cheerful, upbeat tone defied the numbness she felt. Death was something she'd never given much thought to, and the finality of it demanded more than a handful of minutes to contemplate. All she could do now was face it as bravely as she could, and hope for someplace like home on the other side.

"And the truth is, I thought about it. I really did. But the thing is, the Covenant are here to burn Mankind. You, me, Innies, Reachers, Siberians, whatever. They really don't give a damn about our politics, and they are who I choose to fight."

Across the station, Camilla could see the communications mast, pointed in the direction of Motif. At this point, ripping out the wiring was redundant, but she needed something to occupy her mind for a while.

"Well," her antagonist replied. "I guess we do this the hard way."

Out of the corner of her eye, Camilla saw Vaughn fly out an airlock, spinning like a ballerina with coveralls and an SMG, which rather marred the resemblance. After a full revolution, he kicked his legs out, slowing his spin. There was something unnerving about his motions, slow and deliberate as he panned across the Motifward side of the station. Without sending himself tumbling off-balance, the officer yanked his tether and fell back into the airlock.

At this point, it occurred to Camilla that Vaughn had been trained in zero-G combat. Not the flashy ninja bullcrap one saw at the movies, but the real stuff that would give him an absolute edge in their environment. The terror returned in full force.

In flip-flops, it is entirely impossible to do a combat roll or leap for cover. The best Camilla could do was awkwardly run behind a radiator fin.

"You know what the funny thing about life is, Camilla?"

In the light from the Sagan's floodlamps, Camilla saw a tether fly through the vacuum and clamp onto a coolant conduit. Vaughn followed with a running jump, swinging around the entire radiator assembly. He made a three point landing on the base of the communications tower, SMG at the ready.

OK, so mostly devoid of the ninja crap.

"...You only have one to give for your cause," he continued. "Are the Innies worth dying for? The same people who condone the nuking of population centers? Who flood the streets in protest when a terrorist dies?"

The black visor panned across the radiator, and she could feel his eyes meeting hers.

"I thought you'd head for the comms."

That simple accusation was followed by a smattering of silent 5mm rounds. In the harsh light, Camilla scrambled across the surface of the Sagan, sweat running down her back. It wasn't just from fear; under shadows, the radiators were glowing a dull red.

"There's no room for pacifism, Camilla! The only answer to the Covenant threat is a united Humanity, now!"

Vaughn shoved off the tower feet first. With his legs tucked and the SMG resting between his boots, the rogue officer was able to force Camilla back into the cover of the radiators, while keeping the gun firing in line with his center of mass.

Camilla rolled and got moving, using the grating beneath her as handholds. In zero g, the only limit to how fast she could pull herself along the hull was the need to maintain a strong grip, lest she float away from the station.

"Who are you protecting, Miss Rosalia? Would the Insurrectionists lay down their lives to protect yours?"

Camilla pulled her M6E off the magnetic tool rest on her belt and fired a trio of rounds behind her, where she thought Vaughn would come around the radiator fins.

The reply was a flashbang, with more flash than bang in the vacuum. Her visor polarized to protect her vision, but that blocked out everything else. She was, effectively, blind to everything but the time display. A split second later, she realized that she had let go of the deck.

Blind, falling through the void. It woke up every primal fear that knowledge had banished to the realm of dreams.

"Vaughn? Vaughn?" Camilla asked, choking back a sob. "Stop shooting! I surrender!"

Something small rammed into her hip and stuck fast. The officer had caught her with his tether, pulled her back to the deck. As her visor cleared, she realized that she had overshot the radiator assembly, almost fell beyond the recovery point.

"You're safe now, you're fine," Vaughn said, tugging the tether free and hauling Camilla upright. "Hands behind your back."

Again, Camilla complied. There was a clicking sensation as her hands were secured to her toolbelt with zip ties.

"Could've been avoided if you had cooperated at the start, Miss Rosalia," the rogue officer remarked. Facing her, he depolarized his visor and tried to smile. "We're going to go back in, get your biometrics scanned, and then we're going to have a deep discussion about politics. And don't try anything funny. I don't want to actually _have _to shoot you."

"Shoot..." Camilla spat. "Are you schizo? You were hosing me down with that thing!"

"Foam-rubber bullets," Vaughn explained, tapping the clear magazine on the M7S. "Mostly harmless to a person wearing a vac-suit, if only at a distance."

With that last veiled threat, he turned her toward the nearest airlock and grabbed her arm. "Now if you'll-"

He was cut off by a subtle shift in the light. The floodlights on the exterior of the Sagan had a luminosity of 'Not quite enough,' and the smallest change was immediately noticeable. Both humans glanced at the void above them, transfixed by a large comet of plasma. It flared as it consumed two retrieval drones, and then oriented on the Sagan.

"That's..." Vaughn asked. Obviously, he wasn't expecting an answer. His brain just hadn't caught up to the facts.

"By the way," Camilla said. "I launched all the retrieval drones at the Covenant's exit point. That should have put them on a collision course with the destroyer."

Perhaps he was slow today, perhaps he couldn't come to terms with the idea that he'd been outmaneuvered. Either way, the rogue officer turned to Camilla and said "Retrieval drones wouldn't do jack against a Covenant capital ship."

"No," Camilla agreed. "It'd just piss them off."

As death closed in and the shadows disappeared from the Sagan, Camilla burst out laughing.

She couldn't help it. The look on Vaughn's face was priceless.

* * *

><p>The torpedo closed in, gathering size and form, like a wave coming ashore. As a child's sandcastle does when the tide comes in, the UNSS Sagan gave way to the plasma torpedo. Bulkheads crumpled, the interior vaporized, and the explosion of the reactor was lost in the tumult.<p>

Having burned flesh, steel, and memory alike, the wave carried on. Little more than debris was left, ashes and diamonds glowing under the starry sky before fading into obscurity.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: This was a fun short to write. In the midst of an argument with a friend over exactly how bad Halo: Legends was, he lost his patience and said "OK, let's see you do better."  
>This was formalized into a challenge, where I had to write a story under 10,000 words that offers plenty of opportunity for action and scenery porn, does not tie into the novels, and can potentially stand alone without written narrative. My own rules stated that there couldn't be a mech, prototype weapon, or whatever could count as a McGuffin. The story had to stand on its own merits.<strong>

**And so, in the two hour space between first break and lunch at my workplace, I hammered out the plot. And in the ten month span between that summer and now, I got this written up. Hooray for effective time management.**

**Not sure if I'll win the bet, as I consciously made compromises in the story structure. What makes for a good anime short does not make for a good short story, and visa versa.**

**Haven't begun typing the next chapter of Isolation yet, so "Iconoclasm" will probably be next. Maybe.  
><strong>


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